Benue government disowns incident as Obi’s convoy halted by youths

Abdullateef Fowewe

The Benue State Government has claimed it had no prior knowledge of the NDC presidential candidate, Peter Obi’s visit to the state and has distanced itself from an incident in which his convoy was reportedly stopped by some youths on Tuesday.

Kula Tersoo, Chief Press Secretary to the Benue governor, noted that the state executive was not informed of Obi’s trip.

“We are not aware of his coming to the state, and if it were to be security agents that stopped him, it would have been easy for us to find out what happened,” Tersoo said.

He questioned the absence of federal security details around Obi, describing him as “a property of federal government” who ought to be protected.

“As presidential candidate of a party and former governor he is a property of federal government and ought to have been given security, where are those security agents around him and if he is going to any state, the security of the host state should know so as to provide security for him,” he added.

Tersoo also insisted that no youth group acted on behalf of the government and said Obi posed no threat to Governor Hyacinth Alia.

“We were surprised that youth would stop someone, youth can not do anything on behalf of government. Our government doesn’t patronize thugs and in any case Obi is not a threat to the governor, we are not aware that Obi is coming to Benue,” he said.

Obi was reportedly travelling to Yelewata, in Gboko Local Government Area, to commiserate with families of victims of the June 2025 massacre when his convoy was stopped at Gyado Villa along Gboko Road.

By the time this report was filed, he had reportedly returned to Abuja.